The advent of robotic assembly for residential circuit breaker components has realized substantial savings in both component and labor costs as well as resulting in a high quality performance molded case circuit breaker. One such circuit breaker is described within U.S. Pat. No. 4,513,268 entitled "Automated Q-Line Circuit Breaker" in the name of R.K. Seymour et al. This Application is incorporated herein for purposes of reference.
The concept of a modular ground fault circuit breaker proposes a separate signal processor module, ground fault module and a circuit breaker module. The signal processor circuit components are arranged on a unitary printed circuit board by a fully automated assembly process and are tested and calibrated prior to assembly within a ground fault module. The ground fault module is contained within a molded case which contains the mechanical and electrical interacting parts for interfacing the signal processor module with a circuit breaker module within a separate molded case and which contains the circuit breaker operating mechanism, the trip unit and the breaker contacts. The ground fault module is disclosed within U.S. Pat. Application Ser. No. 725,611 filed Apr. 22, 1985 entitled "Ground Fault Module For Ground Fault Circuit Breaker" and the signal processor module is disclosed within U.S. Pat. Application Ser. No. 725,610, filed Apr. 22, 1985, entitled "Signal Processor Module For Ground Fault Circult Breaker" both in the names of R.A. Morris et al., both of which are filed concurrently with the instant Application.
The purpose of the instant invention is to describe a modified automated molded case residential circuit breaker which forms the circuit breaker module for assembly with the aformentioned signal processor and ground fault modules and which, when assembled thereto, forms a completely automated ground fault circuit breaker having ground fault, short circuit, and overcurrent circuit protection.